My Weight, His Shoulders
by Random Fandom
Summary: He stared at the dark wall, still wondering why me? Then he did something the Twilight Zone-like shows always warn about. He wished. He wished he wasn’t himself. Harry gets a glimpse of what life were like had someone else been the Boy-Who-Lived.
1. Default Chapter

A/N: I really hope you like this. It was originally a one-shot until my friend told me it worked so much better as a chapter story, so there will be several short chapters. Also the same friend who gave me the title. Enjoy.

Disclaimer: If I were JK Rowling I wouldn't be writing measly little fics on I'd be writing big books for big bucks. And if I owned Harry Potter I'd be JK Rowling. What does that tell you?

Harry, the Boy-Who-Lived, stared at the ceiling of his bedroom at number 4. Despite the warm late summer weather his body was chilly between the sheets. An owl hooted on a branch outside, and Harry wondered vaguely if he knew the bird. He dared not get up to see. A sidelong glance at the clock beside his bed told him it was midnight, the witching hour. It should start any minute now.

Harry felt his eyes drooping but he snapped them open again. His brain, his sleep-deprived brain, begged for him to rest. Even if it was just for an instant. He ignored it, as he had for the past week. Sleep was the enemy; or rather sleep was the enemy's weapon.

Suddenly his scar came alight with pain. It seared his forehead, splitting open his skull. It was blinding, it was burning into his mind, into his heart, into his soul. The sound of Death Eaters' chanting was coming alive in his ear. If he'd have thought putting the pillow over his head would help, Harry would have. But he'd tried too many times before to do it now. Their mad intoning was growing louder and louder. A great hissing was slithering through their voices. Harry could hear the screams starting now. Women this time, three or four of them. Their voices were screeching for someone to help, to save them, to end the pain. Death Eaters were laughing cold laughs, a small child was crying. He knew if he closed his eyes he would see the images play out in front of his eyes, but he couldn't bear to look. A high voice bellowed an incantation, and the screams turned from horror to utter terror and sheer pain. A new voice was shrieking with them, a male one. After several seconds of shouting Harry realized it was his own voice, but he was much too distracted to stop. The image of a black cloaked person with a hood and a mask…people dead on the ground…a sickly green skull with a snake spewing from it's mouth floating over them…Harry kept yelling, tears rolling down his cheeks.

The door banged open. Vernon Dursley, dressed in a blue pinstriped sleeping gown and with his wife in tow, came charging into the room. He stopped at the foot of his nephew's bed and looked down at the shrieking boy. Pointing a fat sausage of a finger at him, Vernon began his tirade. He was already turning a nice shade of puce.

"Boy! You stop screaming this instant! This is the third time this week! Do you know what time it is!" He hollered.

"Vernon, the neighbors!" Petunia shushed him, hissing in his ear.

"Snap out of it and go back to bed. We will discuss it in the morning." Uncle Vernon, having quieted some, gave Harry one last glare as the teen's voice died. Then he stalked out of the room right behind his haggard-looking wife and slammed the door with force.

Harry slowly sat up and shoved his glasses up the bridge of his nose. His whole body was shaking, and cold sweat drenched his sheets. The room was spinning slightly. Feeling like he might start crying again or screaming, Harry drew his knees to his chest and hugged them. His thoughts followed the regular pattern of who and why.

Who where they? That was always the first question on his mind. Who were the people that had died tonight? Why had they died? Muggle-borns, or just someone on the wrong side of the Dark Lord? Why didn't the Order, the Ministry, do anything to stop it? Truth was, the ministry couldn't and the Order was lost. They no longer knew what to do, couldn't stop the random and almost nightly killings. Then of course Harry's next thought was always why me?

Of all the people in the world to bear this weight, why had God, fate, destiny, whatever you wanted to call it, chosen a scrawny teenage boy to fight a war? Now that he knew the prophecy, Harry questioned it. Why had Voldemort chosen to mark Harry as the equal? Why not Neville? Why not some other poor fool? Why had there been a prophecy at all?

Harry shook his head free of those thoughts. He carefully tried not to concentrate on the faces of those deceased women. He tried hard not to imagine what would happen to the young boy he had heard cry. A jet of pain shot through his scar and he knew whatever it was couldn't be good. To stifle his cry of pain he bit into his hand, effectively silencing his cry. However he left a good amount of teeth marks running across the back of his hand.

With a creak the door to his bedroom came open again. Harry looked up to see a very angry Dudley standing there. He didn't have to ask what his cousin had come for.

"Listen, you can't keep keeping me up for days like this. I won't stand for it. I need my rest, I can't go around with circles under my eyes…" His eyes darted to Harry's hands, his bedside dresser, anywhere near the boy. Harry knew Dudley was checking for his wand, and suddenly he wished it was near him. It would have been enough of a deterrent to keep his cousin away.

Instead the 16-year-old boy found 250 pounds of flesh and bone, and a little muscle, quite suddenly squashing him. Since he had been sitting up his back had gone into the wooden back of his headboard, painfully jabbing into him. Dudley's fists were finding every inch of Harry they could punch; ribs, stomach, eyes, nose, back to the ribs. One shoulder was shoving against Harry's throat, keeping him pinned and silencing him all at once. He turned his head to block a shot but they just kept coming anyways. Finally Dudley slouched off of him, spit on his leg and waddled out of the room.

"If you scream again, I swear I'll kill you." were his last words before the door creaked shut.

Harry sat there, too tired to move from the rather uncomfortable position against the headboard. Blood oozed slowly from a cut above his eyebrow, but he'd had much worse. He only stared forward, at the night filtering through his cloudy window to shine against the opposite wall. He didn't really remember sliding down to get under the covers, only feeling the pain in his back subside. Harry turned onto his side, once again wondering why me? He felt the cold metal nose piece of his glasses against his bridge. He stared at the dark wall, still wondering why me? Then he did something the Twilight Zone-like shows always warn about.

He wished.

He wished he wasn't himself.

Bright morning sun filtered onto his eyelids. Harry fluttered them faintly. They seemed to open of their own accord. Opened to a lovely sky blue ceiling with some clouds and bits of gold sparkles. That made no sense. His ceiling was dingy gray and….and it didn't move. For the gold sparkles were definitely moving. Squinting to see them a little better, he realized they were tiny life-like Snitches soaring across a sky. Before his brain had time to completely comprehend this, a humongous weight bounced itself on his ribcage.

A gigantic black thing was blocking his view of the strange enchanted ceiling. Hot breath blew against his face as a long pink slimy thing licked him again and again. Then the slimy thing retreated into the mouth of it's owner…a large shaggy black dog. It's green-gray eyes were happy and smiling, staring directly into Harry's own emerald green ones. If he could have with all that weight on him, Harry would have jumped.

"S-Sirius?" he asked quietly, too afraid he was dreaming, "Sirius, is it-is it really you?"


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Chapter two, enjoy.

Previously: _It's green-gray eyes were happy and smiling, staring directly into Harry's own emerald green ones. If he could have with all that weight on him, Harry would have jumped. _

"S-Sirius?" he asked quietly, too afraid he was dreaming, "Sirius, is it-is it really you?"

The big black dog gave a loud bark. It leaped from his stomach to the floor beside Harry's bed. Quite suddenly it transformed into a man, a man with shoulder length black hair and brilliant wizard's robes of darkest black. A man Harry had thought he'd never see again.

"That's my name, kiddo, don't wear it out." Sirius chirped, seeming very chipper. In fact, amazingly chipper for a dead person. Harry couldn't believe his eyes.

Before either Sirius or Harry knew it, the thin teen had scrambled from the bed, hooked his arms around Sirius, and was now squeezing him for all he was worth. Sirius yelped and pushed on the boy's shoulders.

"Harry, you bugger, what's the matter?" He wheezed, still trying to push the 16 year old boy off of him. Harry, however, seemed unready to let go.

"Sirius! It's really you! But-but I killed you! You fell through the veil, and Lupin told me I'd never see you again. But you're here! And where is here, what am I doing here? What are you doing here Sirius, you're dead. I'm really sorry I got you killed." Harry exclaimed all rather fast, his words coming out blurred together.

"What nonsense are you rambling about? Let go, Harry!" Sirius was still struggling when Remus walked by the room. Seeing his friend in a bit of trouble, the brunette came in to see if he could help.

"What's up Harry, Sirius?" he asked.

"Well, Moony, Harry's just gone crazy on me. Went flying out of bed screaming something about me being dead and now he won't let go." Sirius explained.

"You being dead? When were you dead, Padfoot?"

"I don't know. I feel pretty not dead right now, although that might change if this kid doesn't let go." Remus grabbed Harry around the waist and pulled him off.

"Lupin, Sirius is alive!" Harry beamed up at the werewolf, still confused about the whole situation but far too pleased to question.

"Yes he is Harry and-Lupin? When did you get so impersonal?" Remus asked, then shook his head, "It's not important. Now why would you think Sirius is dead?"

"Because he fell through the veil. You said he had died." Harry told him, getting confused again.

"When-look I think it must have been a bad dream. We told you not to eat all that chocolate before bed last night, though I guess you can't be blamed for not listening. It's not as if there weren't people telling you it was alright." Here Remus glared at Sirius.

"Hey, he's just a kid alright. Let him have his fun." Sirius smiled.

"He's not a kid. He's 16."

"So what? 16 can still be a kid."

"I know, seeing as how you're over 30 and still a kid." Remus sighed, but not without a smile, "Come on Harry, lets go downstairs. I think your mom is cooking waffles."

Remus and Sirius had both started to exit the room before the brunette's words sank in. Harry stared open-mouthed.

"My-my mother?" he asked to the retreating backs of the two adults. Neither one really heard him, but they did see him whiz by a second later. In fact they were practically thrown against the wall.

Harry skipped stairs in an effort to get to the kitchen faster. He turned to the left-and was stopped by a couch hitting his gut. It was a front room he had turned to face, not a kitchen. Feeling slightly dizzy, Harry spun to the right and ran that way. He stopped when he came to a bathroom, turned around and ran the other way. Eventually he found a door that had to lead to the kitchen, as it was the only door left. With his breath hitching in his chest Harry grabbed a hold of the brass doorknob and turned it.

Directly in front of the door was an elegant mahogany table with three chairs along each side length-wise and one chair at each end. Someone was sitting at the far end, reading a copy of The Daily Prophet. The smell and sound of sizzling bacon wafted to Harry's nostrils. There was a little doorway into the kitchen, and the stove was right beside it. The wall behind the stove was only half a wall, so that someone standing in the kitchen could look right over and see those seated in the dining room. A crinkling sound as the paper was set down and Harry gasped. James Potter was sitting there, in a blue blazer sipping a cup of coffee. His hair was extra tousled from sleep and his hazel eyes looked a little tired behind their glasses. His son stood in the doorway, unable to drag his eyes away. That is, until he heard the humming. Harry looked back over to the stove and saw a woman tending to the bacon. A woman with long dark red hair and emerald green eyes, his eyes, standing there with an apron tied around her waist. Lily Potter was smiling as she flipped the bacon and turned to grab some plates.

"Oh just in time Harry, dear. The waffles are almost finished. Could you-" Lily had to stop speaking as the wind was knocked out of her. Harry was about four inches taller than her, so quite suddenly her head was caught against his chest. "Harry!" she gasped into his night shirt.

"Mom! You're alive! I can't believe it! I never even dreamed-"

"What's going on?" James asked as he sauntered into the kitchen. He was the next unsuspecting target of Harry's hug attack, and was also nearly bowled over by the force.

"Dad, mom, dad, mom!" Harry yelped, alternating his hugs between parents.

"Son, son!" James screamed over the youth's cries. "What in bloody hell is going on?"

"Don't curse, James." Lily admonished, trying to free herself from Harry's grip.

"Oh no, not you guys too." Sirius had arrived to find Harry still trapping his parents. James reached an arm out to his friend, who tried to pull him free to no avail.

"How come I don't get a hug? I feel so unloved." Remus mulled as he watched but did not participate in the freeing of James.

"Come now, Moony. You know we love you." Sirius explained, finally managing to loosen Harry's grip. "Harry's just…"  
"Gone bloody mad? What's wrong with you this morning, son?" James questioned.

"You guys were…were dead and…I was…living with the Dursleys."

"The Dursleys!" exclaimed James, "Your magic-hating aunt and uncle? Why would you ever live with them and-hold on. What do you mean we were dead?"

"You were dead. Voldemort killed you. He tried to kill me too but the curse reflected on all I got was my scar." Harry enlightend, gesticulating to his forehead. The occupants of the room stared at him. It was Remus that spoke first.

"Harry, you don't have a scar."

"What! Of course I do, right there." His hand went to brush his raven hair out of his eyes, but when his fingertips brushed across his skin he stopped. Carefully he examined his forehead with his fingers a little longer, amazed. There was no thin line of uneven skin. Harry turned quickly to find a mirror. Catching sight of his reflection in a copper pot he studied his forehead closely. No lightning bolt. No evidence that he had ever had a scar.

"Bloody hell!"

"Harry!" Lily reprimanded

I know they are short chapters but I like them. I like ending them at interesting points like this.


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